


at least we stole the show

by aletterinthenameofsanity



Series: some stupid noble reason [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Ginny Weasley, Bisexual Harry Potter, Character Study, Coming of Age, F/F, Flowers, Gay Draco Malfoy, Implied Sexual Content, Lesbian Character, M/M, Parallels, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-25
Updated: 2018-01-25
Packaged: 2019-03-09 05:12:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13474395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aletterinthenameofsanity/pseuds/aletterinthenameofsanity
Summary: Every story has a beginning, a middle, and an end. You wish you're someone's ending, but sometimes all you are is a whole lot of middle.Ginny and Harry break up after only dating for a few months his sixth year.





	at least we stole the show

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from "Stole the Show" by Kygo ft. Parson James.
> 
> Also, two songs were mainly used to write this. “The Good Side” by Troye Sivan for the boys, and “Ophelia” by the Lumineers for the girls.

Every story has a beginning, a middle, and an end. You wish you're someone's ending, but sometimes all you are is a whole lot of middle.

(And sometimes, that’s actually the best possible thing.)

 

Ginny and Harry break up after only a few months of dating his sixth year, citing irreconciabe differences. They're still good friends, but there is no spark.

* * *

Harry finds himself pacing the Room of Requirement as his best friends snog each other in the common room above.

There, in the Room that collects Lost Things, he finds Draco Malfoy, similarly worried out of his mind and afraid of not doing what old men tell him is the right thing to do.

 

Here, a relationship is formed.

Nights are spent with them in the Room of Requirement, lips against skin and whispered giggles in each others’ ears. Sheets trail against skin and they wake up entangled in each others’ arms and legs.

Here, they ignore lightning bolt scars and snakes branded onto wrists. They are teenagers, hormone-ridden and full of desire. When they are in the Room of Requirement, whether hanging out in front of the fireplace, spending time in bed, or snacking in the kitchen, the outside world fades. Here, Dark Lords and Headmasters cannot touch them. War is a distant afterthought.

(This little world is theirs, and they know it can’t last. That doesn’t mean they don’t cling to the illusion, though. It keeps them sane.)

They still fight in the hallways, still shout insults across classrooms. The world sees no change between them, and that’s how they keep things safe.

 _(When this war is over,_ they say, kissing their way up the other’s neck, _when this war is over…)_

* * *

“You know, Lunes, that Snorkacks aren’t actually real, right?”

“You shouldn’t listen to the Nargles, Gin.”

“I love you, you know?”

“Yeah, I do.”

* * *

Ginny finds Luna after a Quidditch match, wandering the halls without shoes. She pauses to consider her best friend, and realizes that she really wants to spend more time with Luna than with her older brother and his friends. Now that she's not dating Harry, she has much more reason to focus on other things.

"You wanna hang out at the Great Lake?" Ginny asks Luna, and the girl smiles.

"Of course, Gin," Luna says, "You can always find evidence of the Jalkabars visiting there."

Ginny grins, grabs Luna's hand, and they head out.

 

They dance by the lakeside and watch the stars in the Astronomy Tower, coming _this close_ to breaking curfew on so many nights.

And somewhere, in between all of these adventures, they begin to fall in love.

Ginny hands Luna flowers during class; Luna takes her to see Thestrals that Ginny only started seeing after their trip into the Ministry. Ginny watches Luna as her hand trails down a thestral’s mane, voice soft and loving. Luna watches as Ginny streaks through the air to catch a quaffle, at home in the air.

They can date in public. Ginny holds Luna’s hand in the hallways, scoops her into a hug after successful Quidditch games. Luna laughs during lunches, kisses Ginny in the back of Charms class. Ginny finds Luna flowers to make into crowns; Luna brings Ginny to the Thestrals, teaches her to call each one by name.

 

There is plenty that the world doesn’t see, though.

 

Ginny grew up hero-worshipping Harry Potter. Luna grew up with the ghost of a dead mother.

Luna is referred to as _loony_. She is likened to the spirit of her mother, the lost child who falls in love with all the wrong things. When she goes dancing with Ginny at the edge of the Great Lake, when she clutches flowers between slender fingers and passes out gifts to strangers, muggleborns call her _Ophelia._

(They don’t see the honor she pays her mother, the wisdom she imparts on her friends. They don't see that she doesn't wear shoes as much for her Mother's Nargles as because her classmates steal her things.

They don't see the way she holds Ginny close after nightmares, fingers threading through her bright red hair. They don't see the soup she asks the house elves to make- after she gives them her father's recipe, of course- for her and Ginny when they're feeling down.)

 

Ginny knows what it’s like to lose your mind- she gave hers to a diary, to a ghost, her sophomore year. She had insanity pumped into her brain, a darkness that clogged her system and nearly stole the breath from her body.

In Luna, in her best friend, she finds light. She finds a love so blistering that it burns away the last soggy remains of Voldemort’s soul in hers.

She still has nightmares of Tom Riddle. His words cling to her mind, digging their hooks into her soul.

But Luna holds her, dances with her, shares her heart, and Ginny doesn't have to feel so guarded anymore.

* * *

“You and I- we're a goddamn tragedy.”

“You're being dramatic, Malfoy.”

“By Merlin, I _wish_.”

* * *

(Sometimes, all you can do is wish.

The world falls apart around you, and all you can do is remember the good times. The good things. And hope that the world will get better, that you won’t be stuck in yet another line of tragedies that make up your life.

You hope for a happy ending. Sometimes, that’s all you _can_ do.)

* * *

When it comes time for war, they part without a word. Draco retreats into Death Eaters while Harry fights for the Light. They take the only sides they have been allowed to have, what mentors and family members and teachers have told them that they are.

 

Ginny and Luna become Generals, fighting side by side to defend the weak, the defenseless, the children.

Luna is snatched by Death Eaters and taken to a dungeon. Ginny stays at her home and continues to plot ways to save everyone.

* * *

After the Battle, Draco and Harry meet in the broken remains of the room they once loved. Their cheeks are hollow, their gazes sharp. Their bodies no longer fit into each others’ perfectly (not that they’ve even touched since last year), and they can no longer read each other from a single movement.

(But on the good side of things, the weight of the world no longer falls on their shoulders. They no longer have to fight each other in school corridors, pretend hate because of mentors and race riots.

They don't have to be scared anymore.)

“You came back,” Draco says, a room full of ash between them, and Harry can hear that it’s on the edge of breaking. He remembers nights from over a year ago, before war tore them away from that bed they used to laugh and kiss on top of. They had been so head over heels in _something_ that they’d never gotten the chance to figure out. They’d never been the right people to figure it out.

Harry shrugs. “Yeah, I did. And?”

Draco's jaw levers open and shut. It looks like it pains him greatly to says what he does, but he does it anyway, a sort of desperate hope on his face: “And thank Merlin. I...I missed you, Potter.”

There has always been too much between them, a gulf between the Boy Who Lived and the Malfoy Heir that never seemed to get any smaller, no matter the distance closed between their lips.

But now...their war is over. Maybe they can be more than the boys they were broken into the shapes of.

“You wanna go on a proper date?” Harry asks, “You know, one not in this Room?” and Draco raises an eyebrow.

“You fucking with me?” he asks, the first time Harry has heard him drop his cultivated air save when they were in the middle of shagging last year.

Harry shakes his head. “Nope.” He smiles wearily. “The war’s over. I could take you on a date in the Muggle world, where they won’t recognize us.”

Draco eyes him skeptically. “What did you do with the Elder Wand?”

“Got rid of it,” Harry says. “I like my wand better.”

Draco nods. “Then I think I might take that date.”

Harry lets out a relieved breath. "Good. I don't have to make my whole speech then."

Draco raises an eyebrow. "I do think I'd have liked to hear this speech."

“It wasn't much," Harry says, "Just something along the lines of 'We have a choice now, and we don't have to listen to them.'"

Draco smiles softly. “Fuck ‘em, right?”

Harry nods and Draco steps forward. Their lips connect, and though this is far softer, far gentler, than anything they did last year, it almost feels like it means more. Maybe they _do_ fit each other as well as they used to.

  


Ginny and Luna clutch each others’ hands on the shoreline of a lake they once danced by.

“It’s been quite the year, hasn’t it?” Ginny asks, and her girlfriend nods, bright hair bouncing. There are scars on Luna’s wrists, welts from where she was cuffed and chained in the Malfoy basement, but her smile is as light as the day she crossed the Great Hall to put the Sorting Hat on her head.

Luna nods. “But we’re here now, aren’t we? And there are no Nargles in sight.”

Ginny smiles fondly. “I’d sure hope not.”

Luna holds out her hand. “You wanna dance?”

“Here?” Ginny asks, gesturing to the rest of the rubble-strewn shoreline with her free hand.

Luna shrugs. “Why not?” she asks, eyes sparkling. There is grime ingrained in her skin, a portion of her lower hair is burned off, and her tie is nowhere to be found, but her bauble earrings are somehow still sparkling.

Ginny thinks about it for exactly one second before: “You’re right.” She grins and takes Luna’s free hand in hers.

There are no flowers here, not like the ones that grew in the Room of Requirement when the Resistance first moved there. There are no Patroni moving about, no desperate students, no Neville pining over Hannah Abbott.

The war is over. The two blood traitors are free to dance in the rubble of their school, ignoring the pain in their joints and the scars of their bodies.

Who knows what will happen next? It doesn't matter here and now. They have each other, and for these moments that's all they need.

In the fading light of their childhood war, the girls begin to dance.

* * *

“We’re not a tragedy, Malfoy. You know why?”

“Why, Potter?”

“We’re gonna make it out. This war won’t break us.”

“You promise?”

“I _swear._ ”

“Okay, then. I believe you.”

**Author's Note:**

> SOMEONE NEEDS TO STOP ME! I've churned out so many fanfics lately, it feels like I'm being drained of every drop of creative essence.


End file.
